Children of Purgatory
by SilhouetteInWords
Summary: Original Story. This is just something my 14-15 year old mind coughed up. I make no apologies for... it. If/when you find grammer errors I'm happy to correct them. Warnings for everything a fourteen year old can imagine.
1. Prologue

_**Prologue**_

In a bare room made of stiff silence and brown boxes in a town named for a place that no one really believed existed, waited a man made of secrets, lies and a time hardened ramrod. His thin arms cradled a manila folder and his yellow eyes spun in his head as he stared at the picture inside.

He was close, they were close. His creatures, his creations. They'd told him you couldn't better what God had made but they'd been wrong. He had been there, mixed the drugs they'd been given, it had been his lab and no Anonymity Clause, to rule or regulation was going to keep him from his work. He'd though it had all been gone, that the petri dish had been all that had survived, all that he would ever have and he had been grateful for that. Then he had heard. He might be forced to work for other people with little dreams and little capacity for innovation, his reputation gone because of one little mistake but he still had his ways and he'd heard. And now he was here and he would take them, they were his, he'd known first and he'd get to them first.

He was close.

The silence retreated through the door as it opened and a young man entered. His black hair hung into his eyes and added wait to his stare in a way that angered the man. But he refused to stoop so low as to order the boy to cut his hair. He refused to care.

The door closed and the silence waited outside for a long pause. The boy would not ask why he had been summoned via text to speak to the man. He refused to care too.

"You're going to school," the man said handing the olive skinned youth with the absurd hair the folder he had been contemplating.

"And you are going to walk there with her," the young man took the folder gingerly, tossing the hair he knew the man hated out of his way as he looked down. He didn't look very long at the school photo, he looked at the names underneath.

"You are to befriend her and nothing more. You do not go to the house,"

The boy looked up and the silence battered at the door. The man stared at him and loathed the hair that hung between them.

"He is insane. His wife died when the girl was one and if even a third of what I've been told is true his soul died with her," the boy's gaze didn't falter, "he doesn't have a clue about you and if he did he wouldn't care. Even the boy he used to be wouldn't have cared."

With nothing left to say the two said nothing. The silence waited, ushering in the tick of a tiny black clock that sat on the counter.

"Go," the man said. The boy tossed the picture next to the clock and went. He knew when he wasn't wanted.

He knew _that_ he wasn't wanted. Not really.


	2. Yet Hanging in the Stars

_Chapter 1_

 _ **Yet Hanging in the Stars**_

There was laughter, and screaming, and…..

And something else I can't remember, or maybe there was only the idea of something. It was a strange dream, but then aren't all dreams strange?

My problems spun over hopelessly in my mind as the trees murmured softly outside, like a crowd standing at the window to watch me. Gold and orange light burst from the centre of the sun's sheets of knotted cloud, rebounding off the vaulted marmalade dome above us before returning on the wings of a thousand new colours. It streamed through the window at a sharp angle, gently caressing my cheek before reaching out to Lu and the spoon revolving above her hand.

Lucinda. Lu. My sister. My baby. _My_ Angel.

She giggled as the light shimmered and began flutter across the walls, the metal turning so fast that the space between flashes was lost. From the dusty corners of the room came a bone deep humming, like quite thunder or the waves of some long forgotten ocean. It fused with her laughter and the two sounds swelled, filling the room.

I turned back to the carrots I'd just peeled and reached into the cutlery draw, feeling my favourite knife rise slightly to meet my hand. I began slicing vegetables and tried to think my way out of the hole I'd dug. For the millionth time today.

"Gel, ca'ch!" Lu called delightedly. I reached behind my head and felt the spoon slap into my palm with both my mind and my skin, familiar and defining as my reflection.

"Careful Lu, remember how angry Sir was last time we brock a window?" Her easy trusting laugh was the music of childhood and carried all the ignorance that joy is made from.

"Why don't you help me set the table?" I suggested, distracted by the memories that sprung from my lack of the aforementioned ignorance and the thought of a camomile tea spiked with the gin Sir kept in the cobbered above the fridge. Alcohol should never be mistaken for a solution but it makes a wonderful reprieve.

"Ca' me helps chop?" she asked pleadingly, but I had never - nor did I have any immediate plans to - let her play with sharp things she could move with her mind. Even on this day-to-end-all-days, I was responsible. At least where my baby was concerned.

"Why don't you set the table instead?" I suggested, "See if you can do it without your hands."

And just like clockwork, the chopping was forgotten and, chattering all the while, my little sister began to set our beat up kitchen table.

I went back to the unsalable truth of it.

Our house hadn't always looked like this. That much was obvious although my memories struggled to formulate a newer construction. But where it had once been beautiful and maybe even cosy, now it had aged.

The once polished red-wood floors were scratched and dinted – and in some places stained. The blue, green and red painted walls were peeling and the plaster had holes and dints in it. The entire house had a sense of age beyond its years and deep buried secrets.

Much like the three people that lived in it.

Our father, Michael Sleet was a moody, unpredictable alcoholic with deeply tanned skin and black hair who – at least these past few months – barley spoke to me at all.

I entertained no illusions about taking after my long dead mother. My moods tended to be more subdued and my rages shorter and less violent but I tried not to let my personality splash over onto my sister.

"I'school bea s'I have friends and cutme up 'cause Sir says 've hard work awful and pickowme and die?" Her questions flowed together in her excitement. Tin bowls and another spoon arranged themselves on the table.

"Only if you don't remember to be good," I told her. My voice was a glowing tribute to a lifetime of controlling my emotions. Lu wasn't saying anything she understood, just repeating a jumbled mix of what Sir and I had told her. I would rather be cut up and eaten myself then see that change.

Ignorance is bliss.

 _ **To Divert Briefly**_

 _This might be a good time to tell you that for as long as I can remember I've been calling my father 'Sir.' I can't remember when it started but I didn't dare or really want to stop. Imagine trying to call your parents by their first names instead of Mom and Dad. It just wouldn't feel right._

School.

No preamble, just all of a sudden, midyear, she was going. Lu had been begging _me_ for over a year but the money was Sir's and I'd never _dreamed_ that he would waist any of it on his youngest daughter's education a moment sooner than absolutely necessary. Or that she would ever have the guts to ask _him_. I'd been wrong on both counts.

Sir had drilled it into me, all my life. Never attract attention, blend in, do what everyone else is doing. A thousand ways of saying it. And now my baby was going to school. And if she forgot and levitated a chair the army would probably show up before the police did.

There is a line in one of the Hulk movies – I don't need to explain why I feel a certain affinity with the Hulk do I? – that goes something along the lines of 'that man's entire body is the property of the U.S. government. There is also a story about a girl called Maximum Ride whose series I didn't finish but you understand the point I'm making. I had no shortage of stimulation for nightmares. And even if no teacher saw what she did, if it was just dismissed as the fantasy of children, Sir would hear.

I hadn't told him. I'd known for a while that Lu too, could do this thing we did. I'd been teaching her to control it as best I could. But I hadn't told him. I should have. But at the time… He'd been drunk and he'd though it was me… I'd had a split second to decide and I'd let him think it. She hadn't meant… She hadn't been trying to hurt him.

 _My baby_

In my mind there had been some other time in the future where we would play out her discovering what she could do, while he was there and sober. And he would teach her like he had me. Until that second discovery she would stay in the house as she always had and even if she did have a few accidents there would be no one there to see. His sudden decision to send her to school had blown that plan into smithereens. I'd gone out for a run after he said yes, just weeks ago – had it only been that long? – while I thought it through and realised I would have to fess up and take the heat. Then we would wait 'till September and she'd go then. Having had plenty of time to practice.

Instead she'd had a month.

Because when I got home he was already on the phone to my principle, enrolling her. And now most of the town knew I had a sister. That Sir had used a bad condom and her mother hadn't wanted her and there had been a little girl living in our house unmentioned for four years. And now she would either go to school or the town would get together and say 'you can't leave a four year old at home alone.' And they'd take her. There had already been enough of an uproar. Even if I did tell him everything the minute he got home she still had to go.

There was nothing I could do. I'd taught her as much as I could in a month.

I let the knife in my hand calm me, allowing myself to draw just a little of its essence. It would be okay. It had to be.

"Or aren't sisaning!" Well, maybe that was a bit of an exaggeration.

"Sorry babe!" Clearly not in a forgiving mood she crossed her arms, glared at me and stomped out of the room, tossing her head in a way that can only be learned watching TV far more then is healthy.

Scraping my carrots into the already stemming pot, I took a deep breath and hitched her Gel's floorless expression of apology onto my face before following her into our dingy living room.

 **Mild Digression**

Just like other children substitute 'Mema' and 'Pasketi' for words they can't pronounce, Lu had grown up calling me 'Gel,' a doctored version of the our father's nickname for me which was the only way she'd ever heard me addressed.

I don't say _dingy_ due to any lack of furniture, it was just that, well… Let me back up a bit.

You see while Sir worked on construction sights most of the time, he also owned the only tip in town. (Long story) So whenever someone threw away anything that wasn't quite broken enough to pass muster, guess where it went.

We had a brown leather sofa that was coming apart at the seams and a mustard yellow armchair that wasn't damaged at all but if you're visualising what I'm saying, I think you'll understand why neither myself, nor the previous owner could stand the thing. The only piece of quality furniture we had was the TV, (Are TVs furniture?) it was a massive flat screen that Sir always replaced – often with an even bigger model - as soon as it became damaged in any way and by far my favourite thing in the house.

The sad fact was that our entire street had the feel you get with drift wood, like we had all come from a better time and place and had washed up here for reasons we weren't planning to share and hardly cared to remember.

It was the kind of place where only ghosts dwell, screaming for lost loved ones across their fields of ashes and palaces of broken things.

Our house from the outside looked kind of like a dead animal that hasn't realised that it's supposed to fall over and drip it's pulse all over the ground but instead remains standing, staring at you with a slightly confused expression on its face.

At least in good weather it did. When it rained the animal looked both dead and rotting with the vigorously descending moisture.

We lived at the end of Madden court, which had burnt down before I was born and had never been rebuilt because the P.P.D. owned the land and basically didn't want to. So whilst in theory we had a street with a sign-post and a Google address that wasn't far from school or the mall or anything else in town and no neighbours to keep us up or pry into our rather abnormal lives, in reality we had a lonely, kinda creepy shelter from the empty lots, and the mud, dust and weeds that came and went around the year.

 _ **By The Way**_

 _The P.P.D. - which stands for Purgatory Product Distribution - was the only real company that had been born in our obscure little settlement. They were a bitch to the farmers but as the lifeblood of the town, not to mention the chief employer, they were allowed to be._

And then of course there was the rock, well _rocks_.

Right now you're thinking of gravel, the crunchy grey kind you get at schools that don't have the money for concrete. (E.g. Purgatory Public)

Or maybe you're thinking of a couple of nice boulders left by someone with very little taste in garden decor.

You might even be thinking of some lonely white quartz, strewn across the front yard that would have destroyed the mower if a) either Sir or I had been inclined to mow, b) we'd owned a mower or c) there'd been enough grass to make it worth the effort.

Whatever you're thinking, the truth is infinitely less sane.

The _rock_ in question wasn't the small walked on kind or even the large wanna-be artsy kind. It was massive. Two huge halves of a long-ago-split piece of cobalt pressing up on either side of the house that had been forced between them. They were a sight that scared little children away, and added the final touch to our 'haunted house.' It was a banner built of stone that testified our 'differentness' to the whole world.

If only they'd known how different.

We we're happy though, sometimes. Well, Lu and I were. I had never been able to tell with Sir. He acted happy sometimes but it always felt just a little forced.

 _ **To Correct a Common Misconception.**_

 _People are not like chains. Which brake and are then forever broken regardless of how carefully you balance the pieces in the shape they once held unaided. People are like ice. They can brake sure, but if the pieces are held together long enough they will eventually be able to hold themselves. People can heal. People can scar. People can learn to live with it._

 _The problem is that often there is no one to hold the pieces in their shape. And so whilst they do heal, they become something else._

Once upon a time Michael Sleet broke, and then came Sir. That's why the man who was my father was out getting pissed in some bar and I was coxing Lu out from under the sofa and promising to be a better sister.

Ice and braking.

Look, I know I sound petty and it wasn't like he _made_ me get a job myself he brought food and shit. It was just….I wanted him _here_ not just for me but for her too. Don't get me wrong, I didn't mind taking care of Lu, she was by far the best thing that happened to me on any given day.

I just wanted him around.

Lu was back to her chattering self by the time I finished serving. She looked so beautiful with her blond curls, blue eyes glowing with excitement. She looked like a baby angel.

It really is ridiculous. I came out the image of our father - black hair cut to my chin, skin a rich olive brown and eyes that came only be described as navy - and yet he called me Angel, whereas he insisted on naming my gorgeous, perfect, wonderful little sister after Satan. Lucifer. King of chaos. Lord of Pandemonium. Leader of the fallen.

Still he was the fairest of the angels. And he came up with the idea of freedom, of free will. If you believe that sort of thing.

"Are youb eeing glad haveme to go school with you, Gel?" she looked at me over the edge of her bowl with worried eyes and lamb stew running down her chin.

"I always love to see you happy, babe," I replied, trying not to lie to her.

"Yulike being to school right, don't'ou?" Not waiting for my carefully cultivated reply, she continued.

"I'ma scared, tine nibit," her voice had the sudden sense of losing momentum generally associated with roller-coasters.

"But I wanna bi girl….and noget lonely theny more," she looked at her dinner as she said it, as though admitting something shameful. Touched and surprised, I hurried to reassure her.

"It's ok to be nervous, I'd be worried if you weren't," my voice was softer than I expected.

"Just remember to be polite to the teachers and what I told you about moving things," I winked at her, our unspoken reminder of our secret, "and you'll be fine, you know how to get home if something happens right?" We'd been over this a dozen times but it wouldn't hurt to be _sure_.

"Down the roads towards the mall all the way to the bigs tree," she recited, "left ats the bigs tree, lefts is the hands I don't eats wiv," big solemn eyes gazed up at me.

"Keep going till I get to our burnts streets. Run all the way ands don't talk to anyone, if the copses asks me my name is Loo-sin-da Sleets and I'm four, I lives at number 68 Maddens crts Purgatory, my fasser's name is My-kay-al Seets but he's at work, vey can contats my sister ats school," she paused for breath then continued.

"My sister attendses licken' Pubics School, she is fifteen ands her name is Anne-Jar-La Seets."

She gave a smile of pure self-satisfaction and I smiled and nodded in what I hoped was a well-done sort of way. She didn't get why she had to remember this but that was irrelevant, so long as she could pronounce either my name or Sir's correctly whoever she was talking to would know immediately who she was.

There was always the chance that this little speech would condemn her or simply not help at all, but I tried not to think about that. It hadn't happened yet, and to quote Commander Fury, 'Until such time as the world ends we must act as though it intends to go on spinning.' Or something like that.

"What'll school I'teach?" She asked, back to bouncing up and down in her seat.

"Will 'ey learn me ABC?"

The evening continued in that fashion, the conversation only briefly diverting from school subjects to a debate over whether 'school girls' deserved more ice cream than regular people. (I let her win, as Sir only brought ice cream to have with drinks and we were nearly out.)

At first I thought I was going to have to bully her in to going to bed, but, in a stroke of brilliance, I realised I was now entitled to use of the term 'school night' and after that my baby surrendered with dignity.

When it's all over, all that comes back is flashes, broken pieces, shards that burrow into your skin. And you leave them there, because it hurts less than trying to pick them out. And sometimes, in the right light and when you can bare it. They reflect.

That evening is one of my favourite shards. I suppose because it doesn't hurt as much as the others. I'll always remember it as the night before the beginning. The calm before the storm. The last good day.

We were lying on her bed facing each other. Her under the covers, me not. Our hand intertwined between us. I could just see her in the darkness. She was beautiful. The house seemed to hold its breath as I looked at her, the silence watching her shadowed face with me. The fear inside me twisted. I could lose all this.

"Lu," I whispered, "you can't forget," I winked into the darkness, "you can't let anyone see you move things," I squeezed her hand, "it's our secret."

"Won't," she murmured sleepily, "pomas."

"Gel?" Her voice had that slightly reverent softness that comes with the dark and she felt so warm and soft as I curled my body around her.

"Yeah, baby?" Her room - which had once been mine - had only one small window and with the curtain drawn and the lonely silence of Madden court pressing close, we could have been a mile under the earth, alone, forgotten, _safe._

"Will tell 'ease with gel song?" I'd left her door ajar and with the light out you could almost see a family resemblance between us, the paleness of her skin receding to show common curves and angles in the shadows frozen on the walls.

"Course baby."

The 'Angel Song1' was a poem I had started reading to her years ago, when I needed her to sleep and she was too young to understand why. She hadn't been old enough to pick out the words back then but she'd remembered the rhythm I'd put to it and had loved it enough to keep me murmuring into the darkness.

My voice rose and fell in patens as familiar to me as Lu herself, while the stars slowly came out.

She was asleep by the time I was done and silently slipped from her room. I loved my baby, but I did look forward to this time, when she was asleep and I could let down the walls that kept my darkness from her light.

I put the stainless steel kettle on and got the gin down by mind as I collected a tea bag and a cup by hand.

Usually I'd have gotten the tin cup without using my arms but it would bang against the wooden cupboard door and I didn't want to wake Lu.

Then I attended to my duties as an adolescent by checking my texts.

 _won't b scl 2morO, fam crap_ Joy had written,

"The night is dark and full of terrors," I quoted. Gorge Marten, sending just a little adrenalin into my blood.

Joy would be fine, she was Joy, but I liked the sound of the words.

After that I washed the dishes and drank my G&T, trying to focus all my attention on what I was doing. I updated my Facebook status to ' _the pope hates Catholics, the sky is green and I am looking forward to school tomorrow_ ' but there is a point beyond which you can no longer ignore your problems so after that I simply sank into our beat-up couch and let them come.

I told myself I was scared.

I tried to feel sorry for myself.

I told myself that if I had a choice I wouldn't.

I didn't have a choice, I never had. Even when I'd been little and I hadn't understood what was happening.

I told myself I wanted a choice and it rang truer then Shakespeare.

I wanted control.

Without warning it hit, crawling through my skin, digging into my stomach, wrapping around my lungs and crushing my wind pipe. People who have not felt it can never understand what _true_ self-loathing is, what it really feels like to _hate_ yourself.

I was noAngel, I was dammed, scum, filth, vermin, worse. I was the girl who drank gin in her tea and Vodka in her coffee. There was no word for what I was, no word that could describe a sin like mine. As a general rule I don't believe in religion, it's always struck me as the delusion of people who can't cope. Self-delusion isn't a luxury I allow myself, and regardless religion causes too much suffering to be capable of cleansing anyone.

Least of all me.

The world was turning off, the remaining silver-grey lights fading towards the point where the sun had long vanished.

The sounds simply fading.

And I waited. I wiped down the table, moved the washing that was in the machine to the dryer and put on another load when the stillness got too much. Folded what had been in the dryer.

And I waited. It was late but I knew if I went to bed I'd just alternate between tossing and staring moodily at the ceiling for five minutes before I'd be up again. Once I might have just slept, but we were almost fighting now. Almost. He knew I hadn't wanted her going to school. But he'd done it anyway. She was mine. She had been since the day she was born and he'd never argued with me even when my parenting hadn't rocked.

Now this.

And I waited. I got out my new maths book and did some of the homework sheets.

And I waited.

 _Breathe. Relax. Breathe._

I sat on the precarious little piano stool in the living room with my fingers spread across the scratched and broken keys and I listened.

I could hear the clock on the mantel piece ticking just out of time with the flashing of my watch, I could hear the soft sounds of the wind between the rocks, and once in a while I could hear a car.

To this day the sound of cars at night brings me back to this place, the feel of flaking paint under my hands, the way my breath pulled at the muscles in my face, the ache in hands and thighs.

All the little sounds that make up silence.

And the robin's song.

It was simple, short and repetitive. Sir had been playing it when he thought no one could hear for as long as I could remember and once I'd figured it out I'd been started doing the same. The music was soft and simple and beautiful. The same few bars again and again into oblivion, quiet or loud, fast of slow, into the night.

I heard the eventual brake in this sonic tapestry as much with as my sixth sense as my second. The truck finally turned onto Madden Court. He was late, he'd been avoiding me these last few days. I stood up and climbed the stairs. I didn't rush, I didn't want to wake Lu.

Standing by my night stand I quickly striped off my cloths and crawled beneath the sheets, my hair blending into the shadow cast by my head. I relaxed, lying on my side, facing the window.

And I waited. I listed to the floorboards creek and heard the door open and close, there was a rustle of fabric, I tried to keep my breathing gentle, normal, as I stared blindly at the lamp's dead bulb.

There was a creak of springs and a familiar cold breeze as my father slipped in beside me.


	3. Queen of Hell and Flowers

_**Queen of Hell and Flowers**_

His arm came down around me as he pulled me up against his hard, muscled chest and pressed his lips to the nape of my neck. My body melted in to his heat and I went completely limp in his arms.

So familiar, and yet so wrong.

His lips moved to my chest as he rolled me under his body. He bit my left nipple just hard enough to hurt. My lips parted in a silent gasp.

His hands traced gentile patterns along my thighs and I gritted my teeth against another onset of repulsion. Feeling my abdomen tighten he moved his hands back to my chest, lightly kissing the soft skin under my right breast while his thumb traced circles around my already wet nipple.

When I was younger it hadn't been like this, I'd bitten the covers and sobbed into my pillow when he forced himself inside me. I'd been small then, and this had simply been another -possibly the worst- of my dark secrets. Now he was gentile, now he waited until I wanted it too. Now it never hurt, he made me feel good. Good in a way that felt so wrong and so right. He'd been doing that all my life really, gently asking my forgiveness.

His lips wondered up my neck before finding my own. His kisses were so honest. His and only his. God, he tasted like chines food and beer and _home._

My biceps ached with some unbearable emotion. My father was my life, every thought that went through my head begun and ended with him. I wanted it to stop and to go on forever. I hated the idea of this but I couldn't help trembling as I smelled the skin of his neck just inches from my face.

His other hand moved down to the wetness between my legs and my throat closed like a vice. His breath was loud against my cheek as his lips left mine for the pale flesh just below my ear.

Even as my stomach twisted into a truckies hitch my spine arched, my eyes closed and jaw strained as far as it could go. I felt him brush against my leg, stiff as a nun at mas before slipping inside me.

Smooth and painless, I'd grown into this.

His thrusts were slow at first, like waves of hot wind when you're freezing to death. Like water when you've run so hard you taste blood. Like life and air and sleep and nectar and adrenaline and fire and _steel._

His hands were on my shoulders pushing me down into the mattress, his teeth closed briefly on the cords in my shoulder before he rose, peeling his chest off my body and forcing himself in harder and harder.

His whole body tensed for a moment, then he rolled off me, eyes already closing and sprawled across the bed, sweat glistening on his throat in the one shaft of moonlight that escaped the curtains.

My limbs made a soft scratching as I curled back up, wrapping my arms around myself like I could hold my emotions at bay with brute force.

I didn't hate my father. I couldn't even honestly say I didn't enjoy it, heck I _looked forward_ to it. But that was what hurt.

He made me fell dirty, and weak, and sick. I'd always seen myself as strong, that was what it meant to be 'different' it was hard, really hard. But whenever I'd wished could be like other kids my age I'd always know that if I were, I wouldn't be _strong_. It hadn't been much but it had been something. Lying in my father's bed all hot and sticky I didn't feel strong. I felt like a whore only I couldn't choose my customers and he wasn't really a customer because I wasn't getting paid for this. I wasn't getting shit. And now he was taking my little sister away and if she fucked up and he found out…

Maybe I wouldn't have minded so much if it were my choice. Incest was fucked, sure. But probably not the most fucked up thing I'd ever done. I could have coped with incest. But rape broke something inside me.

I _couldn't_ be a victim in the same way I _couldn't_ be a boy. If I were I wouldn't be me. I'd be someone else. I'd had a lot of awful crap done to me in my life but it had always been a punishment. I'd been a child who had required discipline. It had been harsh, and sometimes not fair. But this was different. Worlds of different.

 _ **A Quote from a Book of Mine**_

' _There in a fundamental kind of trust we give our parents. Lines we trust them not to cross. And if they do then suddenly we are lost. As though gravity had suddenly reversed itself. Children build their understanding of the world around their parents and when their parents are no longer there. Does the world still exist?'_

It was a passage from a book I'd discovered in a set of draws years ago and though I found it a bit dramatic, it was the closest thing to a written description of my situation that I'd read.

It didn't matter how often this happened, every time, it stung like a fresh welt. The only thing that changed was that I learned to like it, and to bear liking it. I guess I had to.

So I lay on the edge of the mattress and I asked myself the question I'd been asking since I was nine.

 _Would you rather be someone else?_

And so far my answer had never changed.

 _No._

Even with Sir's cum sticky between my legs I was glad to be me, I wasn't human, I wasn't normal, I wasn't like everyone else, it was hard, dangerous and scary. But I wouldn't want it any other way.

This was who was, I'd pay whatever tolls the universe set and I be grateful.

That knowledge made feel strong again, made my ghost of a smile real.

Looking back I'm not sure I wasn't just kidding myself but hey, whatever lets you sleep at night. Right?

I didn't know how to be anyone else and I didn't want to. You can insert some sort of hippy shit here about loving yourself just 'as is' if you like. Maybe you'd be right.

Sir and I were different. We were us, and we had Lu, and the rest of the world could go fuck themselves. Right then all I wanted was to sleep.


	4. But To Do

_**But To Do**_

As usual I was woken up not by the sound of our alarm but by the sound of Sir thumping the bed side table in his near-comatose attempts to turn it off. I rolled out of bed, picked up my towel at the dresser, my sense of equilibrium by the stairs and was almost conscious by the time I got in the shower.

It's amazing the power of hot water, the way it can burn all life's trouble from your shoulders, bleach it from your hair. I was careful to let it sink in to every part of my body, every pore of my skin. I imagined it's fire going deep into my very soul, scorching out all the night's memorise in one bone melting wave and leaving me a virgin again to greet the morning.

Gone was Sir's Angel. I was Angie now. I was school me.

Once I was pure and born-again, I, of cause, did all the 'normal things' - washed my hair, brushed my teeth, shaved my legs etc. - and wrapped in a towel and a numbing if childish allusion of virtue, I went to wake Lu.

She looked like she always did, like a reason to live. Her hair didn't have the unearthly resistance of mine, which never seemed to knot or muss. Hers was in a state of constant metamorphosis. Carefully brushed - and misting out slightly bigger than her head - in the mornings after my traditional attempt to tame it and deflated to a horde of perfectly formed curls each waring for space on against her neck in the evenings. Clinging to her cheeks and throat when she was hot and sticking out for an inch before flopping around her shoulders in the cold. Or, like right now, seeming to be a visual representation of the light I saw shining from my baby.

Whereas my hair was a shadow that no amount of sun could conquer hers was a light so enchanting that even on the days I – or as would now be the case _we_ \- were doomed to tardiness and detention I could never forgo this ritual. Just taking a moment after the emotional turmoil of our father to look at my baby, my world. And breathe.

Then I shock her awake and the panic set in.

"Areus late!" she squealed, jumping out of bed,

"Not yet," I told her, gratefully letting my other problems flood back into the forefront of my mind, "but you better get in the shower and remember to clean your face."

After one terrified glance she sped down the hall to the bathroom leaving me to get dressed and wonder if I should have phrased that differently.

If I was honest with myself I'd always known Lu would one day have to go to school. Purgatory is small enough that everyone knows everything about everyone else. Where the guy who runs the pizza place at the mall is your home room teacher's eldest son and is dating your principles assistant. Where you couldn't walk down the street without seeing three people you knew personally but wouldn't bother to say 'hi' because it was so normal.

It was inconceivable that we could 'home school' Lu, and not just because the whole town new perfectly well that Sir was never _at_ home. (Though no one dared talk about it in front of me.)

She had to go, if she didn't, well Purgatory is one of those towns where not sending your kids to school is like not have a number plate.

It brings the cops to your door. We were pushing it already with a mother, who died in an 'accident' and a drunk for a father. I tried, but there's only so long you can morn your wife before the free food stops and the rumours start. If Lu didn't go to school sooner or later some 'concerned' neighbour would make a call and before you could say freak, me and Lu would be in foster care. Then they'd find out and we'd be in a lab, strapped to a table, in pieces.

I suddenly realised I was standing in front of my closet staring off into space.

No. Today wasn't about me, I needed to be 'sistening.'

I put on a grey sleeveless turtleneck with the only pair of sneakers I owned and my favourite old ratty jeans. I wasn't one those kids that _like_ to dress like shit it's just that these jeans had been my mum's, they even had a stain on the back that I hid under my top. It wasn't much, but it was all I had. And I figured I'd need everything I had today.

How very right I was.

After that I went to the bathroom to attend to my sister, hair and make-up. The first seemed to be managing just fine judging be the noises coming through the frosted glass doors of our shower, the second needed only five strokes of a comb but the third took a little longer.

Out of necessity I'd been wearing make-up for years to hide any trace of my last fight with Sir that was still visible after I'd drawn the local essence to speed the healing. Well, you know it _started_ as necessity but continued mainly 'cause it looked good.

 _ **Okay So…**_

 _I guess I forgot to mention I could do that. I'd discovered it when I was six, pulling I guess the 'energy' out of a heater by accident, I'd required physical contact when I was little and it had been years before I'd noticed it sped up my bodies recovery but now I could do it only half paying attention._

Sir was sitting at the dining table finishing a cup of coffee and bowl of cornflakes when I came down stairs and taking my cue from him I willed two more bowls and cups from their respective cupboards, pouring milk with one hand and cereal with the other into first Lu's and then my own before moving to the cups.

Behind me I felt two spoons leave the draw and alight on the table by my hand.

Sir didn't even glance at me but the tin cup we kept sugar in was assisting the spoons in topping off breakfast while I was adding instant coffee to the cups and putting away the rest of the ingredients. And I could feel his mind around them.

"Thank you, Sir," I murmured to my coffee as I stirred the milk and dash of vodka I was adding by hand into the hot water I was adding by mind.

My father grunted at his breakfast.

After repeating the process with my sister's mourning beverage, (minus the alcohol which was not a ritual that I intended to extend from Sir and myself for several years) and replacing our stainless steel kettle on the stove while simultaneously returning the milk to the fridge, I moved to checking her bag for missing items. In all fairness this was more to benefit my nerves than her reputation with the teachers. Lu had everything she needed, I knew, I'd checked three times in the last sixteen hours.

Lu's bag, like most of our stuff, had originated at either the tip, or the local thrift shop. In this case the thrift shop. And like most of Lu's possessions, had originally been mine. It was the extremely cheap, one pocket, and 1:19 fabric to plastic ratio kind that is specifically designed for little kids and featured Dora the Explorer on most of the available surfaces. I'd used it 'til I was eight when I'd moved the straps on a green carry bag, added a draw string and spray-panted it black in protest. I'd only had to survive three days and one minor argument before Sir caved and thrift-shopped me something more age appropriate.

Now it was my sister stuck cramming her stuff behind Dora's ugly mug.

 **The contents of the Dora the Explorer bag**

 **2 forty-eight page lined note books**

 **2 sixty-four page lined note books**

 **1 art pad**

 **1 homework diary**

 **1 English work book**

 **1 pencil cases containing: 4 grey led pencils, 1 pencil sharpener, 1 rubber, 1 set of coloured pencils. (red, yellow, blue, green, orange, purple, pink, brown, black, grey.)**

(I did say _cramming_ )

"You're giving her coffee?" Sir sounded more bored then interested.

"Yes, Sir, she can't be falling asleep in class," I could hear the chuckle in my voice and a moment later he echoed it.

"You're probably right, Angel," I didn't realise he'd stood up 'till he put his hands on my waist. I turned without thinking about it and stood still while he kissed me. His lips were warm and strong and he tasted like coffee.

"See you tonight," he was already walking towards the door.

"Yes Sir," I heard the shower turn off and hurriedly returned all my weird sexual problems and Lu's school supplies to their respective dark claustrophobic places before rushing up stairs to help my baby dress.

I'm always afraid when I do this that today will be the day she gives me that Come-On-I've-Grown-Up-Now look but so far it hasn't happened, and when I walked in it couldn't have been clearer that today was not 'the day.'

She'd entered the room only about a minute before me but in that time almost the entire contents of my sister's closet had been flung against the walls and my baby was curled up under her bed reduced to that almost silent chocking sound that passes for crying when you grow up around our father.

"M'ugly _hic,_ I'wear are ugl _ci_ clothes, I'll _hic_ never haf fit _ic_ in friends _guckguckhic_!"

Her tears made her already questionable grammar close to illegible but I tried to smile.

"Baby you're…..beautiful," I could think of no word more precise, "everyone feels like this on their first day of school, here let me help you."

I lay down on the floor so I could look at her but didn't try to reach her. Under the bed was her safe place, where no-one could get her, it was a lie, but security always is and if I'd learned one thing from my father's parenting it was that the illusion of security is what gives childhood memories that childish glow _._

After a long pause she slowly made her way out and I backed up to give her room.

"How about this one?" I asked holding up a blue dress I'd washed the day before.

"It complements your eyes and makes you look like a priestess of Poseidon," I was laying it on the cotton and lace pretty thick but it worked, so hey?

Round eyed and speechless at having a dress worth such long words she allowed me to help get it over her head.

"Good girl," I stroked her wet hair, "time for breakfast."

We went down stairs and still looking somewhat preoccupied, Lu climbed onto the chair adjacent to her breakfast. I put her coffee down by her elbow and there was a moment where she simply sat and spooned cereal into her mouth while I waited with bated breath for her exclamation which soon made its appearance.

"Me do croffee!" She squealed, suddenly registering the closeness of the familiar smell and looking at me with delight. I momentarily contemplated, how horrible it would be if she had made a wrong assumption and I had to take the cup away from her and thanked my lucky stars that that wasn't the case.

"It's a special day honey," I told her, smiling in a way I only ever did when I was giving her something I knew she wanted. She took a sip and smiled too.

"I croffee like Siryou!" She said proudly. I just nodded. My baby had no idea I put vodka in my 'croffee.' She didn't know Sir did. She didn't need to. The whole point of Vodka is that it neither nether tastes nor smells.

My sister sat and inhaled her breakfast while I watched and worried and felt my hair dry against my face.

Then it was time to go.

I picked up our bags - no point in making her carry all that junk to school, when I'd be right there, and besides, I needed to feel like I was doing something.

"'sisit far, Gel?" Her pink little nose was all crinkled up and she was frowning and hunching her shoulders and the morning chill. It was one of the rare moments when you could tell we were related.

"Not too far, sweetie?" I tried to project smiles onto her though I was feeling the cold on my bear arms like broken glass, "and it will warm up later."

She nodded, her frown vanishing.

I sighed inwardly. Yes, one day my baby would grow up. Would learn. I knew that, could almost kid myself I accepted it. The hate, fear, pain and soul crushing exhaustion that came with life would eventually have to find her like it did everyone else. But not yet.

She was the one thing in my world that was perfect, the only part of my life that was bliss, the single, unaccompanied name on my list of people who didn't know. Oh, no one knew the details, no one but me and Sir. We were the soul inhabitants of our own dark world. But they could see there was something. They could see it in my eyes. Everyone could. Everyone but Lu. I didn't want her to live in that world.

Not yet.

Not soon.

Not ever.

And here I said I didn't do self-delusion.

"Gel, see!" My sweet-heart ripped me out of my bitter contemplations and instinctively my hands rose to shelter under my arms for a moment before I caught them and made then drop back to my sides, thumbs sliding into my pockets.

"Gel, I'can look a boy! Think youme might befer waiting us?" Distracted by plans for my war with nature I took me a moment to figure out what she was saying, then I saw him.

I immediately liked him. He wore beat up jeans and a faded black t-shirt with black converses that looked brand new. The wind picked up his glossy, ebony hair and blew his fringe into his eyes which were too dark for me to guess a colour without getting closer. But what appealed to me was the way he stood, like a murderer who regrets nothing but plans his war with Hell even as he is walks to the gallows.

Like a fighter.

And I immediately mistrusted him. Sir wasn't ridiculous about many things but - sad as it is - he totally went out for the jealous-boyfriend act. And more importantly there was no other house on this street.

Like Lu had said, he was clearly waiting for us.


	5. Benjamin

_**Benjamin**_

The boy stepped forward.

"Hi, I'm Christian,' he said "my dad and I just moved to town, mind if I walk with you?"

As he spoke 'Christian' rendered the question fairly mute by falling into step beside us with the kind of casual arrogance that I'd spent my whole life perfecting.

"So, you like school, kiddo?" He asked eventually, grinning like a siren as he turned to Lu and barely giving me a chance to think let alone formulate a reply.

"First day!" my sister squealed delightedly.

I was dimly aware of him chattering away at her about school but it suddenly felt as if this were all happening on the other side of a very thick sheet of glass. Like my world had suddenly become very separate from that where a teenaged girl worried about her sister's first day of kinda _._ People didn't wait at corners for us. People who were new to town would have no idea who we were.

Unless…

Sir had always told me this might happen, that one day there might be someone who showed an unreasonable interest in us. The government, the FBI, the CSI you name it, I had a whole file of fears on the subject, but the concept that it could be happening for real. Right then. Right there. Was having trouble getting through to me.

The terror tried to bulge inside me, spilling out of the little box in which I kept it confined but I threw my self against the lid with a rage that only desperation can bring until it squelched back into its dark corner. There was a very good reason why this person should not see me react abnormally to his presence. For a second my animalistic need to escape battered against the knowledge that it was imperative I stay where I was.

Mind over matter.

Mind won.

"So you nervous?" Christian asked.

She nodded shyly, grinning, and held up her hand, thumb and forefinger almost but not quite touching.

"Well, guess me and your sister gotta leave you now," he said hefting his bag, "nock 'em dead for us."

I was so furious at his use of the word 'us' that it took a moment for the others to sink in.

Then I looked up. I'd never liked arriving at school, (what kid does) but this was different. In a few seconds Lu would officially be a student, and soon after the world would probably end.

I took a deep breath and turned to look at her.

"You ready," I asked, winking at her. It felt more like a spasm.

Her chin rose in an expression of pure, exulted defiance, as if she really were Lucifer about to take on the might of God. She nodded

"Ready," I smiled.


	6. Veni

_**Veni**_

"She'll be ok, you know," Christian said not looking at me.

"No, you may not walk with us," I spat through my teeth, "you may not talk to my sister, I don't care who you are and if you ever try to walk with us again I'll pull your teeth out with pliers and shove them up your ass."

"Whooooow! Babe, I'm sorry, I'm not that guy…whoever that guy is…" He trailed off uncertainly, "I just heard you lived nearby and thought you could show me around."

I had to complement him on the expression, a perfect mixture of hurt and confusion. He was clearly a very good liar. But there weren't any houses nearby us.

Pasting on my own expression of pleasant innocents, I replied.

"You thought wrong, babe, not my type."

Before he could say anything else I turned and strode away, letting my hips sway as I walked because no matter who he was there were standards to be maintained.

The chatter of teenaged life as I entered Purgatory Public was a pleasant balm of my sprung nerves. There was nothing I could do not. Either we would make it through today. Or not. It was all up to Lu now.

The school was set up on a large block on the outskirts of town. The buildings were mostly brick with the exception of the junior area which was a resent addition to give the crèche to grade fours some privacy. On the up side we had two ovals, four hard courts, two swimming pools, a gym and a cafeteria. On the down side all our books had to come from the town library which - though luckily just across the street - was constantly full of local lowlifes. The entire school only had three sets of toilets between us – which I'm pretty sure isn't even legal - and in total twenty seven class rooms which may sound okay but remember that they had to accommodate all the kids in town above five and then some…..so yeah.

My home group was 10b and my room was P2 because I was in a sports group. Last year I'd had Dr Merad as my home room teacher, which had been awesome. He was funny and good with the ADHD kids as well as being a great teacher who got you through exams whilst maintaining that they didn't really matter. He was the perfect balance of strict - enough to keep the noise level to something that could be learned through - and cool - he didn't pry and respected our space, privacy and individuality. (You can imagine how much easier this made my life.)

Best. Year. Ever.

I was pretty sure that the world was due to take a horrible revenge for the good luck I had managed to filch, but innocent until proven guilty and all that, so I squared my shoulders and I stepped into my class room.

I know most people - and yes, I am one of them - claim to hate school. That's not necessarily a lie, no. But you have to admit there is something kind of nice about walking into a room full of the people you expected to be there doing the things you expected them to be doing. If nothing else what's familiar at least _feels_ safe. And safety is immensely comforting. I am a certified expert when it comes to finding ways to comfort one's self in unlikely situations.

There are only sixteen students in my home group, including me.

 **My Home Group (NTS, add appearances)**

 **Girls:**

 **Francis Gum**

Blond, athletic and totally suited for a sports group. She was captain of the cheerleading squad but it wasn't 'till a couple of years later that I realised she wasn't happy back then. Some girls sleep around for fun but others do it as a kind of self-abuse. She was the second kind.

 **Lindsey Gold**

Francis's second in command, a few inches shorter, and hair a little darker. Lindsey was never quite as loud of as vibrant as her friend. She's one of those people who just quietly makes everyone feel nice.

 **Samantha Wine**

Samantha has strawberry blond hair that she always wore in pig tales. Massive blue eyes that dominated her face and a squeaky little voice that made her seen even more homunculary then she was. She'd joined the debating team a few years back however, and turned out to have a strength of will and determination that could make you forget her starcher.

 **Grace Wilson**

Grace of the famously evil hair. A dark, dusty blond bird's nest that could look mousy on a good day and a skin-over-bones build that was weirdly equestrian. A little shy but once you got to know her she was really nice, Grace's god is nature her life is her crusade.

 **Rose Tanner**

A Montague. I guess she's pretty in and elfish way with brown ringlets just past her shoulders and big green eye. The daughter of the principle and a stuck up little brat. Well, you know no one gets along with _everyone_. I guess as I literally almost killed her once and was deeply involved in her dad's 'accident' she's still a better person then me but I give myself points 'cause I don't fake it.

 **Joy Smith**

Wait, scratch that. True to text I couldn't see Joy.

 **Angela Sleet**

We'll get back to her.

 **Boys:**

 **Luke Johnson**

Luke was chocolate all over which sound odd but the affect is very attractive. He was actually a few years older than us having failed a few times but it didn't bother him. He was young and sexy and had no responsibilities. Life was girls and games.

 **Fin Armstrong**

One of those people you can spend years with and still find you no very little about them. He was in the chess club. He had lemon blond, blue eyes and was skinny but other than that...

 **Ken Ribbs**

The ribs twins are African-American and it feels weird to start with that but Ken was one of those guys who calls people 'Niger' and 'exclusively dates coloured babes' so I doubt he'd mind. He played bench warmer for the basketball team _and_ the mathletes and he's cute he's not like Luke about it so we've always gotten on ok.

 **Cole Ribbs**

Ken's identical twin, he kinda lived in his brother's shadow but I always got the sense he didn't really mind. He never seemed to get upset about it at least. He was a bit of an idiot back then but he might have grown up. We haven't spoken recently.

 **Jerry Pensure**

A little on the chubby side but whilst he's a perfectly nice guy, he's nice in the way a golden retriever is nice and being that precise shade of blond didn't help. I'd considered going out with him a few time out of some kind of moral obligation but, well, if Sir found out…he just wasn't worth it.

 **Cameron Faith**

Mathlete, there's just no other word for it. His silky brown hair was eclipsed along with any personality he may have had by his intense Mathleticness. I don't think he was ever actually tested but we all called Asperger's five minutes after meeting him.

 **Ruben Gross**

He had blond hair but I think he bleached it and was captain of the basketball team and dating Lindsey it worked in a kind of twisted way because she was used to being a second and he was used to not really ever sharing his problems.

 **Oliver Walters**

Black hair but died and in about the same sort of relationship but with Francis.

 **and…**

 **Oh**

 **My**

 **God**

…

 **Christian What's-His-Face**

It's was on. It was _so_ fucking on.

As I took a seat at the back of the class I had to remind myself not to visibly snarl. I could play calm and cheerful with two broken ribs, (I knew from experience) but my face had always had a way of slipping in its own ideas if my attention wavered at moments like this

Breathing through my nose, I tried to calm myself by looking at best case scenarios. Waiting on the corner could have just been an interest in the town freaks and theoretically, the rest could be a coincidence but…it didn't feel that way. It felt like he was _hunting_ us, like he _knew._ And seriously, who was I kidding.

But how?

No, no I couldn't just presume he was clued in, if I did I'd eventually screw up and might give something away. That, ' _how did you know? You told me, just now'_ crap may be cool in movies but real life doesn't have that kind of statistic for _happily_ _ever afters_. Bluff. That was the key. Bluff hard. Bluff well. And go out bluffing. There was no other acceptable option.

"Good morning class," said a thin, reedy voice from the front of the room. Startled out of my revelry by the unfamiliar sound I looked up to see the owner of the voice - a pasty looking man who had to be in his late fifties with oily grey hair that stuck to his head and skin that reminded me of pictures of mummies I'd see in history.

My mind immediately provided me with a diagnosis. Parent or office worker.

And a prognosis. Extreme indifference.

Letting my eyes and mind slide away from the intrusion like they did the mancky old gum I often found stuck to the bottom of my shoe and never managed to fully remove, I returned to my thoughts of death, torture and government spies.

He was sitting in the rear left-hand corner of the classroom which put him directly opposite me. I turned to stare openly now. Would the government even hire someone as young as him? Was that legal? Would that matter? And if he was a spy didn't that mean they already knew about us? Were they just leaving us alone to study us in our natural habitat like they did with grizzly bears? And if so, how long would it last? How long had it already lasted?

He was sitting with his shoulders hunched, chin resting on the heel of his hand, idly doodling in his book. His face looked tense, like he was deliberately ignoring me.

"Miss Sleet?" My eyes focused on the reedy guy I'd dismissed before. He was holding a clip board and looking at me expectantly.

"Present!" I called, years of habit taking over.

Wait what?

No way. They couldn't have. Who in their right mind would pick this guy to mentor a _sports_ group? No. No way.

"Joy Smith?" No answer.

"Joy Smith?"

"My mum said she was away on family business," piped up Rose Tanner.

Reedy nodded, and continued with the role.

Refusing to be distracted by this horrific turn of events, I looked back at the ominous black cloud that had moved in over my morning to see that it was holding up a picture of what appeared to be me naked to a great deal of behind hand giggling.

Something inside my untwisted and I smiled. Regardless of who he was or what he had planned for my future _this_ I was good at, this I enjoyed.

Casually I reached across the aisle and snatched the note out of his hand. I wasn't a wiz drawer but this didn't need to be the Mona Lisa. I finished my addition and held up the new image which now featured me naked with him behind me with his hands in places that my classmates found very funny.

"I'm sorry Miss Sleet but I won't allow note passing, anything you have to say can be heard by the entire class," Reedy seemed to be trying to assert his authority. I scrawled a few words below the drawing and handed it to him.

His eyes widened but after a deep breath he assumed a look that I think was supposed to be condescension.

"Very amusing, Miss Sleet," his lips were curved into a semblance of a smile but his eyes screamed something more sinister. This one was mean, and smart enough to hide it.

"Come on teach," Chris interrupted, surprising me by taking my side, "you just said we all had a right to hear!"

'Teach' moved his stair of doom to my unlikely ally and some sort of silent transaction took place. I think my eyes may have widened slightly. Obviously these two knew each other so where ever Chris had come from, so had Reedy. But that wasn't what made me, metaphorically, stop in my tracks. What confused me was that I'd have been willing to bet a considerable amount - if I'd had it - that Chris was scared of our new mentor. Government spies were not about to fight amongst themselves whist on the job. And fear was a step further. I may have been wrong about Chris. This was turning out to be a very interesting morning after all.

Samantha climbed up and stood on her chair to read over Cain's shoulder.

"It says, 'Give me detention, you know you want to!'" She called out at the top of her tiny voice.

If you were home-schooled through your teenaged years you cannot possibly imagine the effect this had. If you were not, there is no need for me to describe it.

Once everyone had resumed their seats and the noise had been reduced to loud but infrequent hiccups our now rather sunburnt mummy found the need to continue talking.

"My name is Dr Cain and I'm going to be your new home-room teacher," he said in a rush, then paused to insure we were still being what passes for quiet in a classroom.

"I know I'm not what you were expecting," he tried to grin apologetically but the redness of face ruined the effect.

"I'm actually a science teacher, but I decided I wanted to expand my horizons and the school recommended this class."

Translation: my degree is outdated and I've been thrown in with all the other losers.

Well, at least he knew how to suck up.

"Now why don't we start by going around and saying our name, our favourite subject and the best thing that's happened to us in the past week?"

Talk about original.

"Now I believe we have a new student in this group. Christian, why don't you start?"

He rolled his eyes and ummed for a moment before beginning.

"Ok, so the best thing that's happened to me this week was this morning, when I met this _smocking_ hot chick and she let me walk her to school," he gave me a significant look I raised my eyebrows and grinned because there was nothing else for it.

He was good.

 _ **Statement of the Obvious**_

 _In case there is any doubt or your school ran by some other set of unwritten-rules, I'd like to take this opportunity to make sure you understand that there is a difference between school dating and real dating. School dating is done for the benefit of school politics and does not require the consent of, in some cases either party, real dating is very different._

 _Regardless of my opinion, Christian Cain and I were now school dating. Like I said, he was good._

"My favourite subject is Sex Ed, obviously, and my name is Christian Cain."

More laughter and some 'ohhhs' filled the classroom, and a few pore people had to be told by their friends that the new student was the son of the new teacher. Predatory glances rained on the fresh meat and beneath this blanket of noise, I gave him a look.

"For the record," dark-and-irritating added, "I'm not happy about it either."

The laughter became genuine. I had to admit that regardless of his – or his father's - possible intentions towards me and my sister, this one defiantly new how to play a crowed. Damn.

He was _very_ good.

"Ok, so hi, I'm Grace Wilson," Grace cut in, shifting forward on her seat, her tragic hair flopping forward. Grace's hair had featured into our year as a background song that added colour for as long as we had known her. It was thick and mouse coloured and impervious to straightening, curling, jelling, moosing and every other way we had ever been able to suggest that she deal with it. The only thing as yet unattempted was simply cutting it off, but as a teary eyed girl would tell anyone insensitive enough to bring it up, her mother wouldn't let her. Grace was unhealthily prone to doing what her parentals told her. But then so was I.

"My favourite subject is Out Door Ed and the best thing that's happened to me in the last week was on Wednesday, when I heard that their finally going to declare a part of the Forest a wildlife park!" Grace yelped delightedly.

This outburst was met by stunned silence that slowly evolved into half-hearted smiles and congratulations. We couldn't help it, we just didn't get excited about this sort of thing. Discouraged by our lack of interest Grace let her smile fade and slowly slid back on her chair, shoulders hunching.

"That's awesome Grace!" I tried not to sound like I was comforting her, "I live right near the Forest and the amount of times I've been woken up by some pore squirrel…."

Caching on Francis chimed in.

"Yeah, and I've always wanted to go out there so we can practise some of our cheers without sweating through our uniforms but mum wouldn't let me because of rabies," Grace nodded and tried to smile. She knew exactly what we were doing but appreciated the effort none the less.

Poor girl.

"Ok so theoretically it wasn't over the past week but my dad got me a dirt bike and it's awesome!" Jerry, tactfully changed the subject before we ran out of supportive things to say.

"It can go up to 80 and the bull chases it be 'cause it's red. The image of Jerry on a bike being chased by an angry bull was enough to inspire some of the boys to fall to the floor and bang their fists against the vinyl once again.

"Ok, ok class, settle down," Reedy alone seemed untouched by the humour filling the room. "Miss…." he paused for an exaggerated sigh, "Sleet, I believe you're next."

Everyone's eyes turned to me and I rolled mine.

"Ok, so like he said my names Angela Sleet," I drawled, gesturing to Dr C, "my favourite subject would be Skipping-101 and the best thing that's happened to me this week," I brought my eyes back to earth and him-of-the-hair, "would be dry humping the new boy before school."

Right on cue the room erupted with cat-calls and shouted questions. As Reedy made doomed attempts to return order I looked over at Christian. He had turned his chair so he could lounge across it with his elbow on his desk and a grudgingly respectful expression on his face. Our eyes met and a silent understanding flew between us.

The rest of the students skimmed through their own introductions distractedly but no one was really listening. The static in the room was practically wafting out the windows and under the door. The questions like flies buzzing back and forth over people's heads and nothing Cain said could quell the whispers. Lindsey and Francis especially were in their element.

I let them go to town with it and took the opportunity to further study my new toy. He was even prettier, I realised, then he had first appeared, his dark hair and clothes where contrasted by his dark skin but his glossy hair, high cheek bones and warm, bright, burn-through-your-clothes eyes kept him from looking one tone. The hard truth of it was, he was gorgeous, like Drop-Dead-Spank-Me gorgeous. If he hadn't shown such an interest in me and my sister he'd _so_ be my type, but now?

Reedy finished telling Rose how he hoped she'd get into this year's cheer squad to muffled laughter and superciliousness from Frindsey, and stepped up to the white board.

"Now I have some news that I think you're all going to like," he announced, grinning in that way new teachers do when they're trying to get you to think they're cool so you'll do your homework and shut up on command.

"The school athletics day is coming up and as the schools athletics _class_ you've been given middle period in the days leading up to train," ok, I had to admit he'd done pretty good on this one. Shrieks of delight rang from every throat – including mine - as he nodded, smiling and raised his hands for silence.

"Yes, yes I thought that would make you happy, now. This year Purgatory Public will be hosting and we don't want to get shown up on our own turf so please make the most of the time you're given," he made a semi-stern face at some giggling girls who will remain unnamed.

"And of coursethe prize money would go a long way towards getting the new block the teachers want!" Ruben called from his place next to Lindsey and the class chuckled appreciatively.

"Well yes, that too Mr Gross," Cain grinned along with the rest of us, "but the teachers won't be the only ones using that block and the school needs it."

"No shit, Sherlock!" was Ken's hollered reply from the back of the room.

He went on to explain about dates and rules for the competitions, (Reedy not ken) but I didn't bother to listen. I'd always loved sports – I was in a sports class - and moreover, this was something I was good at. We could always do with the money and it wasn't something I'd need to talk to Sir about. He'd said years ago that I could enter any competitions held in Purgatory. And I loved running.

When all else fails, run, run 'till your feet bleed, run 'till you demons fall away behind you, then keep running, just to be sure.


End file.
